


In Which the Reader Will Ponder a Verse Which Had to Do With the Resurrection of a Vampyre, Possibly

by thenewbuzwuzz



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Episode: s05e11 Damage, Gen, Post-Series, please take the Andrew tag as a warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-20
Updated: 2017-08-20
Packaged: 2018-12-17 18:49:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11857515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thenewbuzwuzz/pseuds/thenewbuzwuzz
Summary: Who’s writing a hymn to Spike? I’m not writing a hymn to Spike! Andrew is.





	In Which the Reader Will Ponder a Verse Which Had to Do With the Resurrection of a Vampyre, Possibly

**Author's Note:**

> Reposting from Dreamwidth with small edits.  
> Title adapted from a real chapter title in Les Miserables, two sentences quoted from the AtS episode "Damage".  
> Caveat : I know nothing about Roman magic except what I read in two short Wikipedia articles, one of which I promptly lost track of.

Andrew’s relapse to the Dark Side started innocuously. He sat on a cheap, synthetic chair and battled sleep while an NPC droned on about Roman incantations. The surviving Watchers didn’t seem to grasp that hearing second-hand about how the ancients did everything wasn’t the best way to gain practical knowledge for field work. So a _carmen_ could be either poetry or magic or both. Who cared? Andrew had worked magic just fine without this infodump. He knew the pointless backstory would end up on the cutting-room floor in the hands of a good director.

Why couldn’t Giles train him personally? That would have been so cool.

But no matter! This was but another test of his determination to become a Jedi Master. (Well, technically, a Watcher, which would have to do until he figured out the other thing.) Heroes faced trials by sleep all the time! Tsarevitch Ivan had stabbed himself in the leg to witness the fire demon stealing apples in his father’s garden, and Batman had punched through glass so Doctor Destiny couldn’t trap him in a nightmare. He, Andrew Wells, a survivor of Sunnydale, would suffer through this tedious lecture like a man, which he was.

The professor moved on to discuss formal specifics. Andrew tuned in experimentally. Okay, _naturally_ , it was crucial to invoke the proper name of any force whose help you were soliciting. Anyone who’d ever summoned a demon knew that. It appeared the Romans had gone a bit overboard with that, though, and sometimes used all possible names of a deity to make sure it listens, to the point where the names could be the longest, most elaborate part of the chant. What would it be like, not only getting a spell to be unambiguous and maybe rhyme, but creating this massive string of epithets? Say, if one were addressing Spike…

The rest of the lecture was much more fun, not that Andrew heard a single word. He did make sure to ask if all names of a deity should be used, even those it wouldn’t like. So he struck Captain Peroxide off the list and absently ambled towards the dorms. Spike really needed more bynames for the epic redemption part of his unlife, he mused. Slayer of Slayers and William the Bloody were all good and fine, but those titles hadn’t been who Spike _was_ in quite some time. There was Love’s Bitch, of course, but that didn’t sound very dignified. The Vampyre with a Heart, perhaps? Heart of something? Gold sounded a bit boring, so maybe platinum, like his hair?

He wasn’t _really_ writing the prayer-spell kind of thing that the _carmina_ were, he reminded himself as he sat down and powered up his laptop. For one, the Vanquisher of the First Evil wasn’t technically a deity. Even though by all rights he should be considered a saint. He was just a person, hiding out somewhere in the world since Sunnydale for his own good reasons. (Andrew wished he wouldn’t play dead quite so well. It was sometimes too convincing.) No, Andrew was just following a thought experiment. Though, now he’d thought of it, he could imagine few entities more deserving of hymns than the Wearer of Nikki’s Coat. People sang hymns to Janus, and what was the Good Bad if not a personal icon of Janus?

Late at night, he read the verse a few times out loud, checking for rhythm. It had a nice ring to it. He reread it a few more times. Catchy. He didn’t even need to look at the written text anymore in order to chant the whole thing.

Nothing happened, of course. He hadn’t expected anything to happen. Of course. Because it was not a spell.

So Andrew "let it go", like his therapist always seemed to think he should do. But when Giles next summoned him, Andrew still failed miserably at not looking guilty. However, it turned out all Giles wanted was to send him on a mission! Leading a big team of Slayers! To the other side of the world! Gulp. Icarus of Restfield would not have a problem with this, Andrew thought glumly. He said yes, of course — he was finally getting back into the action, and he could really prove himself this time! Now would be a good time for some encouraging spiritual guidance, he thought wistfully. But, of course, Buffy’s Champion had better things to do than actually appear and guide Andrew, like Gandalf. Thoughts of the Martyr of Sunnydale would have to suffice to help Andrew feel there was hope he’d really be a force for good. A little nudge in the right direction wouldn’t have hurt, though, he thought, because with the way the Slayers were whispering behind his back or, worse, completely ignoring him, you’d think he was still the same lost little nerd he’d been in high school.

Lost little nerds didn’t go about flanked by hot chicks with superpowers. He’d just keep playing the part, and eventually it’d feel real. So he went where he was needed (see? he was _needed_!), and he suited up and tied up and piped up, and he prepared to impress the hell out of an evil law firm that very possibly did actually contain a hell somewhere on the premises.

He waited in the evil conference room, sitting in a chair much too big for him and fidgeting while nobody could see. (If he fidgeted more now, maybe it would help him keep his cool later.) Suddenly, he heard a voice in the hallway. _The_ voice, really.  
It said, “At least I know the game, now, don't I? I killed two slayers with my own hands.”

It was him. It was the Scion of Aurelius himself.

“ _Mamma mia_ ,” Andrew thought, “I summoned a demon again.”


End file.
